Wonk Rant: National Democrats aren’t doing squat to fight racism

Every cycle for the past decade or so, I have to deal with the “Demography is Destiny” prattle from the Left and center-Left, that presumes that younger voters will usher us into a post-racial paradise.

Do millennials support President Donald Trump?
At least a third do, and they are among the most actively involved of their generation.

The issue here is four-decades of disengagement of the Democratic Party from permanent grassroots infrastructure-building, which was instrumental in the creation of a systemic crisis of legitimacy which was successfully exploited by the Right.

The Commonwealth is not exempt from this dynamic.

Here in Massachusetts, I can only go by my own experiences and those of colleagues, which suggests that racism has measurably declined among white working class populations, but greatly increased among white professionals; in particular the fields of STEM, financial services, and (not surprisingly) organized progressives.

While it’s a step in the right direction that the Boston Globe ripped off this particular scab in its series about race in Boston, I see no evidence that there will be little in the way of substantive improvement in the foreseeable future. The reason, in my opinion, is that racism and institutionalized tolerance for sexist physical assaults; and generic abuse of power are hard-wired into a culture of elite entitlement here in the Commonwealth.

This can be addressed, here and nationally, if this disease is treated at the source. It will require comprehensive recruitment at the cultural and geographic level in order to do the door-to-door efforts necessary. Alas, with the conspicuous exception of Howard Dean’s fifty-state strategy, organized Democrats have been reluctant to put forth the effort.

Nearly two-thirds of adult U.S. citizens will stay away from the polls during the coming midterm elections, and they say they have given up on the political parties and a system that they say is beyond reform and repair, according to a Suffolk University/USA Today nationwide survey of unregistered and unlikely voters.

…As for their rationale, 68 percent of unregistered voters and registered-but-unlikely voters agreed with the statement: “I don’t pay much attention to politics because it is so corrupt.” That number is up sharply from a Suffolk University/USA TODAY survey of unregistered and unlikely voters taken in August 2012, when 54 percent agreed with that same statement about politics being “corrupt.”

Nearly 63 percent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed with the statement “I don’t pay much attention to politics because nothing ever gets done – it’s a bunch of empty promises,” compared to 59 percent who said the same nearly six years ago.

…While President Obama endorsed Clinton with enthusiasm, his absence from the presidential ticket in 2016 appeared to hurt Democrats. There were 150 midterm non-voters in the survey who said they also skipped the 2016 presidential election. Of these, more than 50 percent last voted when Obama was on the ballot. And, according to their recollections, 88 percent voted for Obama over Romney in 2012 and 96 percent voted for Obama over McCain.

Hi Paul – could you elaborate a little on this point: “racism has…greatly increased among white professionals; in particular the fields of STEM, financial services, and (not surprisingly) organized progressives.” Particularly interested in the organized progressives comment — I may have an idea of what you mean but not sure. Thanks.

There is a great deal of hard-core libertarianism (of the Ayn Rand variety) within the institutional cultures of High Tech and financial services; this largely manifests as social darwinism (both in terms of racism and sexism – Gamergate is agood example of the latter).

I’ve lost count of the times (my office is near the Innovation District) where the response to a police shooting in a post-work social environment is “he/she deserved it.

The problem with organized progressives is the nature of their operating premise, which involves managing black communities, not empowering them. A point could be made that that Community Development Corporations, for example, are more than anything else colonial structures imposed upon these communities, using racism as a profit center. (I could also expound on the roles of CDCs as precursors of gentrification…)

If non-profit social justice organizations, the environmental movement, the Democratic party, and other entities say they care about racial justice, then why aren’t they upholding the leadership and liberation of those who are most marginalized? Why isn’t racial justice at the heart of their platform? Why aren’t they working with communities of color all of the time and not just right before an election?

Yes, Democrats Larry Krasner and Rebecca Rhynhart will be Philadelphia’s new district attorney and city controller, respectively, and progressives across the city are basking. After a year that’s provided plenty of political disappointment for liberals, I thought that I, too, would share the joy of these victories. But for some unsettling reason, I can’t. I personally feel ripped off and cheated. It’s hard for me to fully come to terms with the bittersweet implications these wins will have for the city and black voters like myself who often help elect such candidates.

I’ve realized how much of a role racial bias plays in current progressive politics: White progressives and black and brown progressives support similar ideals collectively, but not everyone is given the same backing to lead on those ideals. In a move reminiscent of “white feminism,” which attempts to erase the visibility and capital of women of color within the feminist movement, white progressives tell us that we are on the same page fundamentally, but that they will take it from here — often leaving us behind in the long run.

I cited “black progressive political thought” for a reason: most of us aren’t progressive. Per 538.com:

Polling done by the Pew Research Center has suggested that among self-identified Democrats, blacks and Latinos are less likely to describe themselves as liberal than whites. Data from this AP/NORC poll comports with Pew’s findings: The majority of blacks say they are moderate (44 percent) or conservative (27 percent), while just 26 percent said that they are liberal.

This is not to ignore the complicity of certain black leaders in this state of affairs. Martin Luther King warned about this when he pointed out in 1967 that the “Negro’s emissary to the white man man too often becomes the white man’s emissary to the Negro.

But we soon discovered that weapons and uniforms set us apart from the community. We were looked upon as an ad hoc military group, acting outside the community fabric and too radical to be a part of it…

… At any rate, for two or three years, our image in the community was intimidating. The people misunderstood us and did not follow our lead in picking up the gun…

Long story short, black people are only just now emerging from a half-century long period of external control and internalized self-oppression, and I frankly don’t know if this story will have a happy ending. What I do know that client-patron relationships are not conducive to alliances.